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Dr. Jennifer Shuford, commissioner of the Texas Department of State Health Services, has been tapped chief medical officer of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.<\/p>\n
Texas Tribune<\/p>\n
Dr. Jennifer\u00a0Shuford, head of Texas\u2019 public health agency, has been tapped to serve as chief medical officer at Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.<\/p>\n
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President Donald Trump included Shuford among a slate of proposed leaders for the federal agency, Trump said in a Truth Social post on Thursday.\u00a0<\/p>\n
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Trump\u2019s other executive appointments include: Dr. Erica Schwartz as CDC director, Sean Slovenski as the CDC deputy director and chief operating officer, and Dr. Sara Brenner as senior counselor for public health to U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.<\/p>\n
The U.S. Senate has to approve Schwartz\u2019s nomination before she can step in, but Shuford won\u2019t have to as chief medical officer. The Texas Department of State Health Services, where Shuford serves as commissioner, has not responded to immediate requests for comment, including on when she plans to leave Texas.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Trump cited his nominations\u2019 collective “knowledge, experience, and TOP degrees” which he said would “restore the GOLD STANDARD OF SCIENCE at the CDC.”<\/p>\n
Some of the agency\u2019s top leaders have left the CDC over its changes to longstanding public health practices, including to the vaccine schedule that reduced the importance of certain childhood immunization recommendations. National public health watchers say they are more hopeful about the agency\u2019s future with the recent nominations of people with scientific backgrounds and no apparent ties to anti-vaccine movements, including Shuford.<\/p>\n
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Shuford was an infectious disease physician based in Austin before joining the DSHS in 2017. She currently serves on the DSHS Preventive Medicine and Public Health Residency Program and is a member of Travis County Medical Society, Texas Medical Association, and Infectious Disease Society of America.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Before stepping in as a commissioner in 2022, Shuford served as the chief state epidemiologist at the health department and was credited with supporting the state\u2019s public health response through the COVID-19 pandemic. More recently, she helped lead the state through the West Texas measles outbreak last year that infected 762 people and killed two children, the nation\u2019s largest in 30 years. The agency spent more than $10 million to combat the outbreak, covering vaccination and testing clinics and an awareness campaign.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat vaccine is highly effective and was the reason why measles was eliminated from the United States in the year 2000,\u201d Shuford said on Texas Standard last year, during the height of the outbreak. \u201cWe know that that vaccine works, and that\u2019s the best protection that we can get to communities at any time of a person\u2019s lifetime, but especially during an outbreak.\u201d<\/p>\n
Shuford\u2019s steadfast support for vaccines over the years differs from Kennedy, whose tone on shots has shifted, from being adamantly against them to saying they \u201ccontribute to community immunity\u201d in an essay on Fox News last year.\u00a0<\/p>\n
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Joseph Kanter, CEO of the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials, which regularly supports the importance of vaccines, said the organization applauds Shuford\u2019s appointment.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cShe is widely respected within the public health and governmental leadership communities,\u201d he said in a news release, adding that she \u201chas demonstrated exceptional leadership and a steadfast commitment to evidence-based public health.\u201d<\/p>\n
Debra Houry left the position of CDC\u2019s chief medical officer last August telling NPR that she saw \u201can erosion of our science and the data and a lack of trust in it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Houry left her position alongside two others who disagreed with the direction of the agency under the leadership of Kennedy.\u00a0<\/p>\n
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Houry, in a scathing essay in TIME Magazine in December attributed Kennedy\u2019s leadership to recent measles outbreaks and increases of children dying from vaccine-preventable diseases.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThese are not failures of clinicians or health departments,\u201d she wrote. \u201cThey are failures of federal leadership: predictable outcomes when trusted scientific voices are replaced by ideological leaders. The nation\u2019s public-health infrastructure is destabilized.\u201d<\/p>\n
Disclosure: Texas Medical Association has been a financial supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune’s journalism. Find a complete\u00a0list of them here.<\/p>\n
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